Umbra
by LittleBlueNayru
Summary: Twilight Mirror on the wall, tell me; how do Heroes fall?


Disclaimer: I don't own the Legend of Zelda.

Well, I really like Thomas Hardy's "The Convergence of the Twain", a poem about the sinking of the Titanic. I used his style of tercets rhyming _aaa_, _bbb_, etc, but of course, this doesn't compare to his. I built up to an end I wanted to make deliberately fast, but I botched that up wonderfully.

A different take on the Snowpeak Mansion. The only thing cooler would have been if the Twilight Mirror acted like the Dark Mirror and spat out Shadow Links.

I seriously recommend Hardy's poem, by the way. It's brilliant.

* * *

><p>Is it fire Hell exalts,<br>the Hero wonders, as he halts,  
>or is ice the true glory of that hideous vault?<p>

So he muses as he climbs  
>frigid parapets, slick with frost and grime,<br>toiling away without a care for all the wasted time.

He does not know how long  
>he has wandered through the throngs<br>of unyielding guardians with flesh of ice and cruel wolf-songs;

All he knows is unfeeling,  
>a vicious numbness, one gleefully stealing<br>his strength and life and will, layer by layer peeling;

a jagged parasite  
>drawing in and sapping the fight,<br>drinking deeply, leaving naught but frozen bites

that sink too far into the skin  
>to possibly contain the warmth within,<br>and let it escape freely, spiteful and sanguine.

Finally, he reaches stable rock,  
>and, fingers fumbling with key and mammoth lock,<br>passes once again through a gateway to his destiny, unblocked.

Once inside, he finds  
>nothing to unease his mind,<br>which only uneases him more in kind.

He checks the ceiling and the walls,  
>each little crevice he recalls,<br>and finds nothing at all.

Disturbed but not dissatisfied,  
>he takes a weary world-worn sigh<br>and face-up on the ground he lies:

He slowly takes stock of the room:  
>circular, with a bed for bride and groom,<br>diminutive attending furniture bordering the gloom.

The stone wall rises into the sky,  
>ornate sanctuary mirrors observing from up high;<br>a gothic cathedral; chilling, unwelcoming, and malign.

The only spot of sun in this dark Place  
>lies beneath his boots and hidden from his face;<br>a rich red rug, with goldenrod embroiders, fine as lace.

The green-garbed Hero rests,  
>until the trembling in his chest<br>ceases, and he begins again on his quest.

He raises his refreshed girth  
>and searches, seeking to unearth<br>a one-fourth fragment four times and more its worth.

For awhile he paces round,  
>covering and recovering again the same ground,<br>until as last his eye espies, and finds what he wishes found.

There, with dark eye and edges dim,  
>sitting stately in an equally obsidian rim,<br>reposes regally what has sent him, risking life and limb:

The stillest water suspended,  
>coldly and perfectly clearly reflected,<br>with an apathetic air of danger and dread,

the Mirror of Twilight stares straight back  
>at the Hero, whose heart lacks<br>Shadows, and slowly the depths within acquaint him with bleak and black.

Terrible images appear before its glare  
>and wrest open the doors of mindless fury and despair,<br>unleashing an evil that, perhaps, had always silently slept there.

Only when the Twili hears  
>the groans of her companion dear,<br>she emerges, face-to-face with her deepest unrealized fear.

She knows just what her precious Mirror can do,  
>and knows with horror and misery that her Hero's life is through<br>(at the very least, as his bones break to wolven shape, the only life he knew).

As never before the man wracks with unbearable pain;  
>never before known felt such agony, never wishes to again;<br>and neither shall he have to, for his wolf's song reaches its final refrain.

With an agonizing roar,  
>he succumbs, and knows no more,<br>and with a resonating thunder, his Destiny shuts the final door.

The beast's sanity slowly recedes  
>and with him the girl of shadows pleads,<br>but nothing now can reverse the foul Mirror's deed.

A flash of teeth, a piercing bark,  
>and the dark wolf lunges at the dark girl in the dark,<br>and never before have the differences between them seemed so stark.

The shadow stumbles with a cry,  
>shrieks, and turns to fly.<br>wondering, how can Destiny's plans have gone so awry?

Dungeon indeed; the darkest room  
>encases the heroine in the darkest tomb.<br>Trapped, she faces no choice but to meet her doom.

Vainly still she tries to flee,  
>soars for the windows and fails to break free;<br>no longer will her faithful Magics let her leave.

A sudden roar from behind  
>and the unyielding puncture of canines,<br>the teeth sinking deeper into her spine,

this she ignores,  
>escapes, and heads for the door<br>as down her back the blood pours.

With fading sight, she collapses  
>on the ground. And as the pain elapses,<br>the wolf corners, and traps,

And with a savage victory low,  
>the claws and teeth all rake in formless rows,<br>and upon her battered body deal the final blow.

For one moonlight blizzard night the beast  
>hunches over his feast,<br>and time depletes, and at the next moon lies deceased.

And all the while the Mirror glows,  
>and all the while the Mirror knows,<br>And the eternal shard of Mirror forever in the darkness makes darkness grow.

* * *

><p>...Eh. It could have gone better, it could have gone worse.<p>

Hope you liked this.

-LBN


End file.
